There is another surgeon who has been on these forums for several years. His screen name is faithisbelieving and he was in the MLC section for quite some time. His W is a witch. You probably have enough surgeon colleages as connections, but if not, his latest thread in surviving is here:
I've been hanging around here since 2006. Can't ever remember a single person posting, particularly here in MLC, saying how glad they were to be dealing with a spouse who has wigged out.
But if you hang around here long enough, you will come to discover something. The people who sound the most grounded, the most satisfied, the most at peace with themselves and their lives...those people are not necessarily those who were successful in restoring their marriages (though ALL of them tried faithfully).
They are instead the people who eventually managed to pry themselves away from the constant up and down of a life hanging on the words and actions of a mixed up spouse who was doing sometimes despicable things, and somehow managed to invest their newfound alone time in looking deeply inside themselves and making positive, life long changes.
I'm not telling you to stop hoping to save your marriage. I'm telling you that I think to be successful you actually have to stop TRYING to save your marriage with your every breath and thought. You have to learn how to roll with the punches, how to respond (when you need to respond) and how to keep quiet when that is the proper response. You have to learn how to look longterm instead of disecting each and every interaction and tidbit of information as though its the deciding fact.
Start even now fixing YOUR life, the part that does not directly involve your wife right now. You are a doctor. You are a son. Perhaps a brother. You are a father. You are a friend. How can you take advantage of this time apart from your wife to become a better one of each of these? Because I'm telling you my friend, if you can find a way to do that, you will also find the way to successfully navigate this chaos you're going through now.
You cannot control your wife. And if other's experiences tell us anything, you cannot reason her to your side either. If, and I repeat IF, she is MLC, then I would tell you that I think she's on a nasty trip right now of trying to accumulate things and get rid of things all in an effort to quell the unrest and confusion inside. You, and how she is dealing with your relationship, is just another of the things she is trying to change to ease that unrest.
In her mind you MAY be the problem. In her might she might even be pretty convinced you ARE the problem. And as long as you're filling that role, anything that you do that tries to change her or infulence her is just more evidence that she has perhaps judged you correctly.
What she needs to see in you is consistency, strenght, and decisions that are made with integrity. YOU have to be the solid, dependable one - even in the face of her rejection. Becoming her adversary, or outright rejecting her only reinforces the possibly faulty thinking she has done.
It's an incredibly difficult tightrope, particularly if you intend to deal with this directly, day after day, always responding to her words and actions, rather than taking your own personal bull by the horns and moving forward with YOUR life.
Blessings,
Bill
"Don't tell me the sky is the limit when there are footprints on the moon."
its almost as if you were inside my mind when you wrote that.
WOW. I am amazed by your insight, your empathy, and your wisdom.
Since my last post I talked to a friend of mine who got divorced. He said (as everyone here has)that the most important thing is the kids... it finally hit home.
In the last two days I listened to family-- who care about me-- snooped on wife (now regretting..thank you very much) got a new bank account, and told her she cannot have the kids be with OM and that she needed to be down here with me, thinking if I "got control" I'd feel better.
you know what? I felt like CRAAAAAAAAAAAAP. So after talking to my buddy-- literally an hour ago, I called the W (we have basically been on clipped, 5 word email communication last two days) and told her,
"Look. Truce. This is not me. I am not a person who likes a fight, likes conflict. At the very least, no matter what happens between us, I want to be friends-- if nothing for the boys. Us being adversarial will only hurt them. My focus now, in my life for the next 12 years specifically, is to be a good dad. I want those boys to say, when it is all said and done, "he was a good dad"."
all of you, I am SURE, know how that was recieved.
Well.
but you know, to be honest, the last two posts from Bworl and Mach are very important in that they touch on something that I have been wrestling with. You know in the solution based thing the "successful men"? I'm sure as I did, all of you pored over those things constantly at first, feeling that "success" meant hardware on the left finger. I honestly, and you will all kill me for this, felt that the advice from people who are divorced is not as "good" as people who "busted!". I am learning that is obviously not the case at all, and my perspective is changing.
what they really need under 'successful' is people who have been able to become better and move on to happy lives.. don't ya think?
but what you touch on is very important, perhaps life altering for me today. the fact that people wouldn't trade this experience is interesting. there is no doubt I will be a better person for it. the pain has been like nothing I have ever experienced in my life. but I hope, as you say, I will also be "happy" that I went through this.
I'm not telling you to stop hoping to save your marriage. I'm telling you that I think to be successful you actually have to stop TRYING to save your marriage with your every breath and thought. You have to learn how to roll with the punches, how to respond (when you need to respond) and how to keep quiet when that is the proper response. You have to learn how to look longterm instead of disecting each and every interaction and tidbit of information as though its the deciding fact.
You come here with a definition of success, and then you find out that the definition changes.
I am a success not because my wife is still married to me, but because I DBed, (and listen up boneheads : ) STILL DB to this day and always will no matter whom I am with)
Same with Bill.
Same with Mach...most of the time.
That wisdom and insight is paid for in hard times and overcoming...empathy from having done it and seeing it in others.
So when I say you can do this...
I mean you can become a success.
Few people realize this quickly what that truely means. So...I am impressed.
I am also impressed with your honesty of your initial reasons.
And I thought you just liked the advice I gave. ; )
Experience is a brutal teacher, but you learn. My God, do you learn. - C.S. Lewis
Life is usually all about how you handle Plan B. - Jack3Beans
Listen without defending; Speak without offending - FaithinAK
Aren't these folks the best? They really are. By now you're finding out they weren't always the best. Some weren't the best spouse or parent for different reasons, work, life, karma ...
But they've become the best, or their best, because of this MLC cr@p and that is now your mission. They changed themselves into the people they were supposed to be, and didn't know they wanted to be. Many of them are now on a path that doesn't include their X, their alien, their person they knew they would never be able to live without. Most of them are doing very well, although some have taken to hunting zombies.
Randomizing now - cause I got no point really.
Part of the WORST for a lot of us was that we feared we lost the M we were to grow old in, and the person we were to rock on the porch with. I said "was". We learned as we grew. We felt we lost some set of values learned in growing up; and it was not our choice. It was all taken. We don't know why. We were just left knowing it must be our fault, our crime, and we are now being punished. We may have even allowed someone to convince us we deserved that.
FEAR tells us it may last forever, and 'that' can become more pain than we believe we can carry. If so, speak with someone you are comfortable with spiritually or professionally. Fear cripples us and robs us of reality. Hope lightens our load and lifts our heart. Seek hope, for the important things, starting with your best life.
When you two were talking on the phone and texting "nice" you enjoyed that. It felt natural and would have been great if it were real. She was playing - keeping it nice and making life easy for her. No hard questions. No hard decisions. Bought her some time and space. Guess what the aliens want most? Time and space ... ok, privacy and secrets just comes with that. If she didn't tell you about the time and space thing already, she's not a very good alien yet. Get ready, she's just warming up. She'd have liked to keep it nice so if she decided to end things, it could end nice. Nice can be ok if it is working for you; but don't believe it is real or buying leverage. It's just nice. Don't expect to discuss OM and things be nice. Don't expect to tell her who she can/can't have kids around and it be nice.
I agree you should tell her your concerns about confusing the kids, as a loving dad. You have rights, when they are in your care. She has rights. But demands can be a lot like ultimatums. Guess what aliens really really turn batsh!t crazy mean over? If you have concerns about the health and safety of your kids, speak to a L or local authorities. That is the only time you need a PI, earth splitting no turning back take no prisoners court battles over the most important thing on this planet.
